Her namesake smiled to herself as she thought of it. Fortunately here
again she was safe. Having lived so much abroad, and having spoken
fluently in several languages, she had not contracted the habit of
employing all the hundred-and-one words of current slang such as are on
the lips of most young people.
On the whole, she decided it was useless to consider possible pitfalls.
They did exist, but she must rely on her quickness and presence of
mind, and hope to escape them.
After a while she summoned Mrs. Goodman and asked her help in the
matter of songs. Could she tell her of any songs Francis had cared for
particularly? The old woman looked puzzled at first, but after some
reflection said that, in a lumber-room, there was a pile of music which
had been cleared out of the library years ago. He always had his piano
in the library, she explained, and it was there that he and Miss
Philippa used to play and sing together. "The same piano stands in the
morning-room now. I have so many things that were his. My lady told
me to throw away his bats and racquets and such things, but I couldn't
do it. And some of them he himself asked me to take care of for him,
many years ago in his school-days. He probably forgot all about them,
but they were safely kept. Will you come one day and see them, Miss
Phil?"
The girl promised readily. She was only too anxious to learn all she
could; every detail of his life, however seemingly unimportant, might
be of help to her.
The old woman sat talking for a time, and then Philippa suggested that
they should go together in search of the music.
Mrs. Goodman demurred, saying she feared the place might be dusty, for
it was long since she visited it, and no one else had access to it; but
Philippa laughingly overcame her scruples, and they mounted the stairs
together.
The sun was low and it was growing dusk when they entered a rambling
attic at the top of the house. It was filled with the heterogeneous
collection of odds and ends such as accumulate in any large
house--pieces of furniture, broken or too worn for use; pictures, some
with frames and some without; toys, a nursery chair, and who knows what
beside. Mrs. Goodman laid her hand on a rocking-horse which peered out
of the gloom like some weird monster, head upreared and snorting
fiercely.
"The Major told me nothing here need be disturbed," she said, with a
little quiver in her voice. "He was always so fond of his horse." But
in the latter part of her sentence it was clear that "he" was not the
Major. The old woman stroked the battered steed tenderly. "It doesn't
seem long since I saw him ride it," she went on; "sitting on it in his
little holland blouse as proud as a prince. He was very small then,
and as soon as he was old enough his mother gave him a pony. Gipsy,
its name was. I shall never forget his delight."
"Have you known him ever since he was born?" asked Philippa gently.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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